Wednesday on the Homestead

-




Good Morning!
I slept in a bit this morning and it felt great. I've been getting up to get outside and walk/run before it gets to hot. Today is not supposed to be as warm so I figured I could sleep in and get out later on. 

It's been a relatively easy going week.  I've mostly kept busy with home things. We'll be leaving soon to go down to California to be with our daughter who is due to have a baby. We are hoping to be there for the birth, but don't want to leave to early. First babies seem to run a bit late in our family. I've been doing a little prepping and pre packing to be ready to leave when the time is right. 

I also got my kitty, Pila, to the vet's office this last week to be fixed. So no more babies. Hopefully she'll settle down to be a nice house cat now. If she does escape (like she did earlier this year) I don't have to worry about kittens. 

We've been enjoying the lovely summer evenings, sitting outside and relaxing. The fun thing about having our duck, Ping, is that he is so social! The other evening he must have heard us and came on up for a visit.. 

 

He's a lot of fun to have around. :) 

As summer is getting to the end soon the yellow jackets are in their frenzied state of aggression.  Last year I made some homemade yellow jacket traps that worked very well. So I did that again this week and they're doing a great job..

 
I wrote a how-to about this last year. If you'd like more info on this and see how I make these and how they work you can find that post HERE. 
 



Goals
Today I have a few things to get done on my list:

~catch up on laundry so we have what we need to pack
~pay a bill online
~research some things online for my hubby
~prepare some blog posts to go out while I'm gone

Not sure yet what I want to make for dinner so I'll work on that. I don't have any leftovers to rely on tonight! :D



For the Love of Books!
I finished Anne of Avonlea and loved it. I haven't started another book yet and since we'll be leaving I may wait until I get back to pick another one.


Projects
No big projects right now.



Fitness and Health
I've been working most days on getting out and walking and running and working to eat well and I'm feeling good. 

 

View from my Deck
The morning started out with sunshine and a few clouds when I took the first picture and started writing this post. Since I've been working on this post clouds have rolled in completely. There is rain in the forecast today which is good, it will help settle the dust down and keep the threats of forest fires away.


What it looks like now..


 



Today's weather: High: 69  Low: 55



That's all for this week my friends,
Crystal

Comments

Post a Comment

All messages are moderated. After approval your message will be posted. Thank you for your comments!! Crystal :)

Popular posts from this blog

Canning Chicken Noodle-less Soup

-
Image
Today was one of those busy days that it seemed I was moving from the time my feet hit the floor until this evening.. But, I got so much done and that is a great feeling! :) One of my accomplishments today was canning 14 jars of chicken noodle-less soup. I call it “noodle-less” because you can’t can noodles. They end up falling apart. So I canned the chicken, veggies and broth. When I go to use the soup I will bring it to a boil and then add a handful of noodles (any type of pasta will work) and cook it until the noodles are done. Because I plan to add the pasta after the fact I wanted to make sure there was enough chicken broth to do this. So I only filled my jars about half to two thirds with chicken and veggies and then filled with chicken broth. Here is how I did this…. I started off with 2 chickens that were a total weight of about 10lbs. I put them in my 14 quart stock pot… I then added 2 gallons of water.. And 3 tablespoons salt.. I brought this ...
Read more

Canning Cabbage

-
Image
I had 4 large heads of cabbage that weighted about 25 pounds. We had some really hot days and I figured I better get the last of them picked soon. My daughter Sierra and I ended up processing 3 of them yesterday and I have one left for a meal on my menu this week. I made pickled cabbage and then canned up the last of the cabbage. Here is the recipe for the pickled cabbage (according to how I made it)… 8 pounds cabbage 1 large onion 1 ½ red peppers 1 lb carrots ¾ cup salt 9 cups water 12 cups white vinegar 10 cups sugar 1t mustard seed 1t celery seed Slice cabbage thinly. Slice onion and peppers. Grate carrots. Mix all veggies together in a very large bowl. Sprinkle with salt and mix in well. Let sit for 2 hours to soften veggies. Rinse veggies well.  In a large stock pot (mine was 14 quarts) combine water, vinegar, sugar, spices. Bring to a boil. Add cabbage/veggies. Bring to a boil. Fill hot pint jars with veggies using a slotted spoon. Fill jar with brine...
Read more

Canning Beef Stew

-
Image
In my last blog post I shared that I had bought 10 pounds of beef roast. I cut it all up and used 4 pounds in 2 crockpot freezer meals ( http://homesteadinghomemaker.blogspot.com/2012/02/two-more-crockpot-meals-for-freezer.html ) . I used the other 6 pounds of meat along with potatoes, carrots, onions and celery to can beef stew. Here were the general proportions I used in canning 7 quarts of beef stew.. 6# beef 2# potatoes 2# carrots 1# onions 1# celery After I cut up the meat and got the freezer meals done I moved to the beef stew. I peeled and cut up the potatoes and carrots. I chopped up the onions and sliced the celery. I pulled out 3 quarts of veggie stock from my freezer to use for liquid in the stew. You can use beef or chicken stock or you can use water. I did not add anything to thicken the liquid as usually thickeners don’t hold up in canning. You can thicken the broth after it is opened if you would like. I added 1 teaspoon salt to each of my ...
Read more